General

The statistics on financial markets offer an insight into capital, money and  stock markets developments. They also provide information on interest rates and exchange rates as well as payments systems and instruments.

Price aspects: interest rates and exchange rates

The price aspects, such as interest rates, yields and exchange rates, come under separate sections on “interest rates” and “exchange rates”

Interest rates consist of a whole range of interest rates and yields which permit the establishment of price levels in Belgium for the money market, the capital market, rates for customers and various rates recorded on foreign markets.

The data concerning the (short-term) money market include interest rates on treasury certificates, interbank market rates (EONIA and EURIBOR), and the principal interest rates of the Eurosystem monetary policy.

The (long-term) capital market section comprises the yields payable on the secondary market on government-backed bonds intended for both private and institutional investors.

The customers section covers both debit and credit interest rates and a number of listed rates which make it possible to monitor the segment of the Belgian market geared to individuals.

Finally, an international section covers the euro markets and some foreign national benchmark rates.

The section on exchange rates comprises the elements of the euro system and therefore the EMS indicators plus exchange rates of all countries in the world. It also includes movements in the gold price.

Market activities: capital markets, money markets and stock markets

In regard to market activities, statistics are available for securities and shares.

Several sets of statistics are available for both short-term and long-term securities. In the case of securities issued by the government, individual information is available on both issued and secondary market trading. For dematerialised securities other than shares, information is available per holdership.

Developments on the equity markets are also monitored. More specifically, this concerns time series relating to various domestic and foreign stock markets and covering various elements (market capitalisation, volume of business, market indices, etc.). The information covers more than just listed securities and also includes data on issues of CIU units, for instance.

Payment systems

Finally, statistics are compiled on "payment systems and instruments", such as the number and amount of interbank payment operations, the number and amount of cashless payments per instrument, and statistics on payment cards.